Lionel Messi, widely regarded as the world's greatest soccer player, immortalized his son Thiago by getting a tattoo of the infant's name and handprints on his million dollar left leg.

The black-inked tattoo, located on the Barcelona star's left calf, depicts his four-month-old's hands and name, which was written in cursive. Photos of the tattoo were released via Twitter by the Argentinian star's brother, Matias, who revealed earlier this week that the siblings planned to get tattoos.

Antonella Rocuzzo, Messi's longtime girlfriend, gave birth to Thiago on Nov. 2, 2012. Just 72 hours later, the spawn of soccer's greatest player was signed as an honorary fanclub member of Argentinian team Newell's Old Boys, his father's first professional club.

The short speedy Messi, nicknamed "The Flea", has won the FIFA Ballon d'or, an award given to the world's best player of the year, each of the last four seasons from 2009 to 2012.

Messi set the European record for the most goals scored in a single season when he netted 73 goals during the 2011-12 campaign. That same year, he set the single season goalscoring record in Spain's La Liga by scoring 50 times. In February, he scored his 300th goal for Barcelona, an extraordinary feat for the 25-year-old.

Messi, whose net worth is estimated over $100 million, is currently with Argentina's national team and captained the side during their 3-0 World Cup qualifier win over Venezuela on Friday.

The magical leftfooted striker scored twice against Spanish league team Rayo Vallecano last weekend and thereby extended his consecutive goalscoring record to an incredible 18 straight league matches.

Messi signed a new contract with Barcelona in February which will see the star stay with the Spanish giants until 2018. Any team interested in prying Messi away from the Catalan club will have to pony up $335 million to trigger his release clause.

Tags
Lionel messi